I Destination

An analysis of the linguistic composition of campaign

slogans and their relevance for destination branding

Karina Gentgen

European Master in Tourism Management

www.tourism-student-conference.com

Original sketch by Milton Glaser displayed at MoMA,

• 1977: New York launches campaign

with the new slogan ‚I heart/love NY‘

• 2014: New York still uses it

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New York

Official logo and slogan trademarked shortly after its launch

Clever combination of words orlucky shot?

Table of Contents

‘What does the linguistic composition of campaign

slogans reveal about their relevance for destination

branding?’

• Literature Review• Literature Review

• Methodology

• Results & Discussion

• Conclusions & Implications

• List of References

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Literature Review ‚The Destination‘ (1/3)

• What is a brand?

‘name, term, design, symbol, or any other feature that identifies one

seller's good or service as distinct from those of other sellers.’ (AMA, 1995a)

• Branding: the act of creating a brand by integrating communication toolsand product differentiation

• What is a destination brand?

‘name, symbol, logo, word mark or other graphic that both

identifies and differentiates the destination; furthermore, it conveys

the promise of a memorable travel experience that is uniquely

associated with the destination; it also serves to consolidate and

reinforce the recollection of pleasurable memories of the

destination experience.’ (Ritchie & Ritchie, 1998, p. 17)

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Organic Image (Gunn, 1997) Induced Image (Gunn, 1997)

• What is image?

‘the sum of beliefs, ideas, and impressions that a person has of a

destination.’ (Crompton, 1979, p. 18)

Literature Review ‚The Tourist‘ (2/3)

already existing knowledge and

attitudes towards the destination

accumulating from

• past experiences

• sources of factual information

(books or media)

• recommendations by family

members or relatives

impressions influenced by

marketing practices of the

destination itself

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Literature Review ‚The Slogan‘ (3/3)

• Brand elements

‘[…] trademarkable devices that serve to identify and differentiate

the brand.’(Keller, Apéria, & Georgson, 2012, p. 153)

• include visual, verbal and oral features that transmit the brand’s unique selling proposition

• Slogans, catchphrases, taglines

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• Slogans, catchphrases, taglines

‘short phrases that communicate descriptive or persuasive

information about a brand.’ (Keller, Apéria, & Georgson, 2012, p. 178)

• Length: 1-10 words (average 3-5 words)

• Position: next to the brand name

• creating a favorable image

• communicating the unique selling proposition

• contributing to differentiation from competing destinations

Methodology

• Content Analysis with Wordsmith 6.0

• Corpus: 522 slogans (2,671 words)

• Publication between 1977 and 2013

• Length: 1 - 10 words

• In English

• Branding of countries, states, islands and cities• Branding of countries, states, islands and cities

• Majority from USA, New Zealand, UK

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Methodology

The Are England Than

Of Is Florida Austria

• Stoplist: 52 words

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A So Hong Kentucky

It St Kong Scotland’s

To Carolina Jersey Singapore

In Connecticut Zealand Scotland

And Indonesia Like Conneticut

On Ireland Virginia Belgium

With Got Dakota Cyprus

S Ve Re C

As An Wales Alabama

All Austria From Scotlands

At That Another France

Methodology

N Word Freq. %

1,00 YOU 34,00 1,27

2,00 WHERE 26,00 0,97

3,00 YOUR 26,00 0,97

4,00 CITY 24,00 0,90

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5,00 NEW 24,00 0,90

6,00 DISCOVER 19,00 0,71

7,00 FOR 18,00 0,67

8,00 WORLD 16,00 0,60

9,00 COME 15,00 0,56

10,00 COUNTRY 15,00 0,56

Methodology

Hypotheses

• High number of pronouns (personal pronouns ‘I’ and ‘you’ )

• High number of verbs, nouns or adjectives (‘feel’ and ‘love’)

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• Grammatical mood of verbs in the imperative form (‘come’)

Results and Discussion/Hypothesis 1

• Personal and possessive

• ‘you’ (34 instances)

• ‘your’ (26 instances)

• ‘we’ (9 instances).

• ‘I’ (6 instances)

N Word Freq.

1,00 YOU 34,00

3,00 YOUR 26,00

26,00 WE 9,00• ‘I’ (6 instances)

• ‘my’ (5 instances)

• ‘our’ (4 instances)

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26,00 WE 9,00

50,00 I 6,00

60,00 MY 5,00

80,00 OUR 4,00

Results and Discussion/Hypotheses 2 & 3

Nouns

‘love’ (15 instances)

‘life’ (13 instances)

‘time’ (11 instances)

‘experience’ (9 instances)

‘heart’, ‘nature’ and ‘paradise’ (7

N Word Freq.

12,00 LOVE 15,00

14,00 LIFE 13,00

21,00 TIME 11,00

25,00 EXPERIENCE 9,00

39,00 HEART 7,00

41,00 NATURE 7,00 ‘heart’, ‘nature’ and ‘paradise’ (7

instances),

‘spirit’ (6 instances),

‘adventure’ (5 instances),

‘beauty’ (4 instances)

‘culture’, ‘diversity’, ‘friend’ and ‘fun’ (3

instances)

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41,00 NATURE 7,00

42,00 PARADISE 7,00

52,00 SPIRIT 6,00

53,00 ADVENTURE 5,00

71,00 BEAUTY 4,00

92,00 CULTURE 3,00

93,00 DIVERSITY 3,00

94,00 ESCAPE 3,00

98,00 FRIEND 3,00

100,00 FUN 3,00

Results and Discussion/Hypotheses 2 & 3

Verbs

‘discover’ (19 instances)

‘come’ (15 instances)

‘love’ (15 instances)

‘be’ (14 instances)

‘live’ and ‘visit’ (11 instances)

N Word Freq.

6,00 DISCOVER 19,00

9,00 COME 15,00

12,00 LOVE 15,00

13,00 BE 14,00

19,00 LIVE 11,00

‘live’ and ‘visit’ (11 instances)

‘welcome’ (8 instances)

‘explore’ (6 instances)

‘enjoy’, ‘make’ and ‘see’ (5 instances)

‘go’ (4 instances)

‘escape’ and ‘feel’ (3 instances)

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22,00 VISIT 11,00

33,00 WELCOME 8,00

48,00 EXPLORE 6,00

56,00 ENJOY 5,00

58,00 MAKE 5,00

63,00 SEE 5,00

73,00 GO 4,00

94,00 ESCAPE 3,00

97,00 FEEL 3,00

Results and Discussion/Hypotheses 2 & 3

Verbs

‘discover’ (19 instances)

‘come’ (15 instances)

‘love’ (15 instances)

‘be’ (14 instances)

‘live’ and ‘visit’ (11 instances)

N Word Freq.

6,00 DISCOVER 19,00

9,00 COME 15,00

12,00 LOVE 15,00

13,00 BE 14,00

19,00 LIVE 11,00

‘live’ and ‘visit’ (11 instances)

‘welcome’ (8 instances)

‘explore’ (6 instances)

‘enjoy’, ‘make’ and ‘see’ (5 instances)

‘go’ (4 instances)

‘escape’ and ‘feel’ (3 instances)

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22,00 VISIT 11,00

33,00 WELCOME 8,00

48,00 EXPLORE 6,00

56,00 ENJOY 5,00

58,00 MAKE 5,00

63,00 SEE 5,00

73,00 GO 4,00

94,00 ESCAPE 3,00

97,00 FEEL 3,00

Results and Discussion/Hypotheses 2 & 3

Adjectives

‘new’ (24 instances)

‘big’ (10 instances)

‘beautiful’ and ‘great’ (8 instances)

‘different’ and ‘real’ (7 instances)

‘little’, ‘natural’ and ‘special’ (5 instances)

‘pure’ and ‘wild’ (4 instances) ‘

N Word Freq.

5,00 NEW 24,00

23,00 BIG 10,00

28,00 BEAUTIFUL 8,00

30,00 GREAT 8,00

38,00 DIFFERENT 7,00

43,00 REAL 7,00

57,00 LITTLE 5,00

61,00 NATURAL 5,00

64,00 SPECIAL 5,00

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‘pure’ and ‘wild’ (4 instances) ‘

‘full’ (3 instances)

Superlatives

‘more’ (8 instances)

‘most’ (4 instances)

‘better’ (7 instances)

‘best’ (7 instances)

64,00 SPECIAL 5,00

82,00 PURE 4,00

88,00 WILD 4,00

99,00 FULL 3,00

N Word Freq.

31,00 MORE 8,00

35,00 BEST 7,00

36,00 BETTER 7,00

75,00 MOST 4,00

Conclusions & Implications (1/2)

• Emotion vs. Fact

• General vs. Specific

• Barriers to the perfect slogan:

• Simplicity of branding efforts

• Multidimensionality of destinations• Multidimensionality of destinations

• Heterogeneity of target market

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• Tools for the perfect slogan:

• Identification of the destination’s

uniqueness and organic image

• Expertise in the area of destination

branding

• Integration of all available brand

elements

Conclusions & Implications (2/2)

elements

• Selection of appropriate

communication channels

• Research in the area of destination

campaign slogans

• Selection of different target groups

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Limitations & Further Research

• English slogans only

• No stilistic devices

• No semantic relationships between words

• No temporal comparisons

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• No comparative analyses between slogans

• No rating of success

Interrelation between destination slogans and tourists‘ willingness to visit

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Thank you for listening!

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